Police procedural set in LIVERPOOL
Short novel set in MANHATTAN
11th June 2026
Room on the Sea by André Aciman, short novel set in Manhattan.
Many people will be aware of this author’s work via the film Call Me By Your Name (inspired by the novel of the same title). He is a gentle writer, who takes his time to settle the characters in their skins and who then come to bond over the smallest gestures and the minutiae of everyday life.
Paul and Catherine are waiting for jury selection and they connect as the waiting continues. He is a lawyer, she is a ‘shrink’, and from the first cup of coffee there is an instant understanding and kinship. Over a single week, in scorching Manhattan, they share observations and life histories and there is some wistfulness that their lives didn’t intersect at an earlier time. As it is, they are married and Catherine is a grandmother. There is musing of what might have been, but, they ponder, is now the time to upend their lives for the promise of something newer, something deeper, based on – literally – only hours of connection?
The lure of a sojourn in Italy tantalises the pair, which gives the novel its title. Paul knows Naples very well and whilst meandering in Manhattan, they happen upon a gallery where a painting reflects their Italian/Mediterranean dilemma, it calls to them.
Brief Encounter for the 2020s, this is a beautifully drawn story of two people, tenderly told, set in the heart of Manhattan. You will be inspired to visit Caffè Reggio, which is reputed to have introduced New York to the Cappuccino in 1927. The characters move around the city and there is a good sense of the all-permeating heat that suffuses the tarmac and the buildings. Of course, the title gives no indication of the city setting because it refers to their joint fantasy of lodging in Italy by the sea.
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